He nodded, and I think I might have said the two vile words aloud.
“When she tricked me out of my powers and left the scraps, it was still more than the others. And I decided to use it to tap into the mind of every Night Court citizen she captured, and anyone who might know the truth. I made a web between all of them, actively controlling their minds every second of every day, every decade, to forget about Velaris, to forget about Mor, and Amren, and Cassian, and Azriel. Amarantha wanted to know who was close to me—who to kill and torture. But my true court was here, ruling this city and the others. And I used the remainder of my power to shield them all from sight and sound. I had only enough for one city—one place. I chose the one that had been hidden from history already. I chose, and now must live with the consequences of knowing there were more left outside who suffered. But for those here … anyone flying or traveling near Velaris would see nothing but barren rock, and if they tried to walk through it, they’d find themselves suddenly deciding otherwise. Sea travel and merchant trading were halted—sailors became farmers, working the earth around Velaris instead. And because my powers were focused on shielding them all, Feyre, I had very little to use against Amarantha. So I decided that to keep her from asking questions about the people who mattered, I would be her whore.”
He’d done all of that, had done such horrible things … done everything for his people, his friends. And the only piece of himself that he’d hidden and managed to keep her from tainting, destroying, even if it meant fifty years trapped in a cage of rock …
Those wings now flared wide. How many knew about those wings outside of Velaris or the Illyrian war-camps? Or had he wiped all memory of them from Prythian long before Amarantha?
Rhys released my chin. But as he lowered his hand, I gripped his wrist, feeling the solid strength. “It’s a shame,” I said, the words nearly gobbled up by the sound of the city music. “That others in Prythian don’t know. A shame that you let them think the worst.”
He took a step back, his wings beating the air like mighty drums. “As long as the people who matter most know the truth, I don’t care about the rest. Get some sleep.”
Then he shot into the sky, and was swallowed by the darkness between the stars.
I tumbled into a sleep so heavy my dreams were an undertow that dragged me down, down, down until I couldn’t escape them.
I lay naked and prone on a familiar red marble floor while Amarantha slid a knife along my bare ribs, the steel scraping softly against my skin. “Lying, traitorous human,” she purred, “with your filthy, lying heart.”
The knife scratched, a cool caress. I struggled to get up, but my body wouldn’t work.
She pressed a kiss to the hollow of my throat. “You’re as much a monster as me.” She curved the knife over my breast, angling it toward my peaked nipple, as if she could see the heart beating beneath. I started sobbing. “Don’t waste your tears.”
Someone far away was roaring my name; begging for me.
“I’m going to make eternity a hell for you,” she promised, the tip of the dagger piercing the sensitive flesh beneath my breast, her lips hovering a breath above mine as she pushed—
Hands—there were hands on my shoulders, shaking me, squeezing me. I thrashed against them, screaming, screaming—
“FEYRE.”
The voice was at once the night and the dawn and the stars and the earth, and every inch of my body calmed at the primal dominance in it.
“Open your eyes,” the voice ordered.
I did.
My throat was raw, my mouth full of ash, my face soaked and sticky, and Rhysand—Rhysand was hovering above me, his eyes wide.
“It was a dream,” he said, his breathing as hard as mine.
The moonlight trickling through the windows illuminated the dark lines of swirling tattoos down his arm, his shoulders, across his sculpted chest. Like the ones I bore on my arm. He scanned my face. “A dream,” he said again.
Velaris. I was in Velaris, at his house. And I had—my dream—
The sheets, the blankets were ripped. Shredded. But not with a knife. And that ashy, smoky taste coating my mouth …
My hand was unnervingly steady as I lifted it to find my fingers ending in simmering embers. Living claws of flame that had sliced through my bed linens like they were cauterizing wounds—
I shoved him off with a hard shoulder, falling out of bed and slamming into a small chest before I hurtled into the bathing room, fell to my knees before the toilet, and was sick to my stomach. Again. Again. My fingertips hissed against the cool porcelain.
Large, warm hands pulled my hair back a moment later.
“Breathe,” Rhys said. “Imagine them winking out like candles, one by one.”
I heaved into the toilet again, shuddering as light and heat crested and rushed out of me, and savored the empty, cool dark that pooled in their wake.